Conclusion

Both power supplies I’ve tested today are good. Indeed, I have got not a single serious complaint about the SilverStone Nightjar SST-ST45NF or the Seasonic X-400 Fanless SS-400FL. Both are going to be a good choice for building a quiet home computer.

Between the two, the Seasonic is the better option. It represents the company’s new platform that features nearly all economically justifiable technologies and solutions available today. This platform proves to be suitable for designing fanless PSUs as well. By achieving high efficiency and placing hot components apart from each other on the PCB, the developer made heavy and bulky heatsinks unnecessary while cooling the PSU through convection only.

In conclusion we would like to award Seasonic X-400 Fanless SS-400FL with our Editor's Choice title:

Still, I have to remind you that building computers with fanless PSUs requires some experience. You shouldn’t try to remove all the fans from your system case because they cool not only the components they are actually attached to, but also other things, like the power transistors of your mainboard. Graphics cards with passive cooling get very hot, and may even overheat altogether, if there is no airflow along their heatsinks. Therefore, the reasonable solution would be to install one or two low-speed fans (500-700 RPM) which would ensure a weak, yet constant, intake of fresh air into the system case without producing any noticeable noise.